Technical standards organizations sponsor mailing lists to allow geographically distributed members to collaborate via email and web-visible archives. The purpose of the mailing list is to exchange information on a given topic. Mailing lists may be created for specific projects, topics or discussion threads. They may support open or closed discussion forums, or function as newsletters or announcements.

An alias is an email address that automatically forwards every email it receives to a list of other email addresses, called the alias list. Like the aliases you create in your own email address book, aliases used in the Kavi® Mailing List Manager and other applications provide a convenient way to send email to multiple email addresses at once.

A mailing list is basically an email alias. Unlike aliases, which simply forward all messages, mailing lists are managed by software that supports the application of rules and features such as digests and archives. Mailing list rules allow for the creation of public, private, moderated, and unmoderated list types, control who has permission to post to each list and determine the availability of web-viewable email archives. Email addresses in this list are generally referred to as subscribers.

Most mailing lists are discussion groups which accept messages (i.e., posts) from their subscribers, members or the general public. Posters may introduce new ideas, submit questions or respond to messages posted by others. In this way, mailing list participants engage in an ongoing conversation on the designated topic.

In order to protect intellectual property and assure high quality list content, most lists apply rules designed to restrict participation. The Kavi® Mailing List Manager can be configured to support different sets of rules and features for different types of mailing lists. The rules engine works by filtering all email sent to a mailing list according to the rules for that list. For example, some mailing lists are moderated, so all messages posted to the list are routed to moderator mailboxes where the moderators can review and approve each message before it is distributed to subscribers.

Figure 1.1. How mailing lists and aliases work

Aliases and mailing lists are designed to meet different needs. The guidelines below can help you decide whether you should create a mailing list or if an alias will suffice.

Mailing lists have a lot of powerful options. They are perfect for distributing formal and official email to a large number of email addresses and for facilitating open discussions. With all this power comes an abundance of choices. For each mailing list you create, you will have to decide who can access the list, how subscribers are added, whether email archives are kept and visible, who the moderators will be, and a host of other options. Because mailing lists can operate in so many different ways, they can be more work for administrators to manage.

Aliases are a simple and quick way to have email sent from an official email address on your web site to a small group of other email addresses. Email sent to aliases can be scanned for viruses before it reaches the alias mailbox, but is otherwise forwarded without undergoing any kind of rule-checking. This makes aliases great for administrative or event contact email addresses, because even though more spam will get through to an alias, the absence of rules also means that important email to administrators can't get blocked by a moderator or other mailing list rule. This allows administrators to determine for themselves what constitutes a good or a bad email message.

Aliases must be manually updated by an administrator if they need to forward email to new or different email addresses. For this reason, an alias is not a good choice if members or the general public should be allowed to sign up to receive the email. Email sent to an alias is also not archived on the web site. If you are an administrator receiving important business email through an alias, it is important that you retain copies of the email you receive for auditing purposes as this information cannot be retrieved through the web site.

It is important to know that aliases and mailing lists handle bad email addresses differently.

Because mailing list management is so much more complex than managing aliases, most of the Kavi Mailing List Manager tools and support documents focus on mailing list rules, configuration and implementation. If you are responsible for setting up a new site, you should study the Concepts documents using the organization's rules and policies and the web site requirements to provide context for your studies. If you are responsible for managing an existing site, you can use the site itself to provide your context.

Once you understand the basics of mailing lists, list types and list configuration, you can use Kavi Mailing List Manager Admin Tools such as Add a Mailing List and Manage Mailing Lists to create and manage lists.

Simple by comparison, aliases are discussed on this page and the System Aliases document in the Appendix. Information about creating and managing aliases is provide on the page help for the Add a Mailing List and Manage Mailing Lists tools.

One last topic of interest to mailing list administrators and users is email. Since mailing lists and aliases are based on email, information such as How Email Works email and email troubleshooting is included in the Concepts.